When leading a Ranger group you never know quite what suggestions you're going to get when you say: "If you could do anything, what do you want to do at Rangers?" So when the reply was 'the zip wire over Eden', we were partly relieved and partly terrified that we'd have to do it too!
We booked the zipwire between Christmas and the New Year - it seemed like the perfect way to say goodbye to 2021 and welcome 2022 with a new group of Rangers: we had two ready to make their promise, and a large number of new recruits to enthuse and excite - we'd grown from a group of two Rangers to seven over the autumn term.
We invited our friends from Constantine Rangers along too, for the first of hopefully many adventures together!
It was a grey and mizzly afternoon, but that did not dampen spirits as the Rangers got kitted up and jumped into the mini bus to take them to the 'dispatch tower' on the other side of the Eden Project. It seemed that the leaders were more concerned at that point as the bad visibility meant we couldn't see the other end of the zipwire as we waved them off!
The first two Rangers shouted their promise out as they flew over the biomes, and arrived back at base camp as fully enrolled members. (We did remake their promises later so that we could properly hear them!)
The words 'sky diving' were mentioned as we all enjoyed a hot chocolate after the zipwire, we're not sure that suggestion is quite as manageable...but watch this space for more exciting adventures of our Ranger group!
We're grateful to Girlguiding HQ for the grant supporting units with growth and retention, meaning we were able to subsidise our Rangers and ensure that the activity was accessible for all members.
Jessica
Falmouth Ranger Leader